Getting obsessed with early retirement

[doneat54]

Hello group.

Given a whole bunch of things going on in my life and the economy, I have been spending a lot of time lately looking at the feasibility of my retirement plans, that to date have simply been in my head. And I have to say, I am pleasantly surprised!

I am 51 years old, married, my youngest just turned 18, and I have worked in corporate America for 27 years now, and always had it as a goal to retire (from the 9-5 corp world anyway) around 55. And probably like many of you, I have only recently had the guts to start checking the balances on my retirement accounts again.

Anyway, for now, the one question that made me search for retirement forums and landed me here:

How can I estimate my SS income if I don't draw in it until well after I quit working?

I just created an account at the .gov SS site, and it gives me the estimated 62/67/70 benefits. But that site assumes I will be working until those ages, and trust me, I will not.

I'd like to get a decent estimate of SS benefits for if I retire at, say 58, and don't draw SS until, say 65. I googled SS calculators but didn't find much. Just want a reasonable estimate.....

Thanks in advance, look forward to participating here in the future....!

 

[pb4uski]

There is a link on the ssa.gov site where you do your personalized estimate to get an estimate if you stopped working today. I don't recall the specifics of where it is but if you look around a bit you should find it. In my case, stopping at 56 vs FRA was only $25 a month or so different IIRC, In any event, it was so small it didn't make any difference in my decision to RE.

 

[doneat54]

Ahh, I found it. It was on their "calculators" page, opened a separate browser window. Had to manually put in my earnings history. It showed no difference in monthly benefit if I "stopped working" 55 all the way to 61. Does that make sense??

 

[pb4uski]

Ahh, I found it. It was on their "calculators" page, opened a separate browser window. Had to manually put in my earnings history. It showed no difference in monthly benefit if I "stopped working" 55 all the way to 61. Does that make sense??

No difference doesn't entirely make sense to me unless you have had high earnings for many years and essentially maxed out. I'll admit that I am no expert on the benefit calculation though. Perhaps others can help.

 

[obgyn65]

Welcome, John.

 

[Alan]

No difference doesn't entirely make sense to me unless you have had high earnings for many years and essentially maxed out. I'll admit that I am no expert on the benefit calculation though. Perhaps others can help.

When I did the calculation while I was working, I only had 23 years of working in the USA at age 55 and I was surprised at how little difference it made if I worked from 55 to 62 or quit working at 55.

So I agree with you that someone who has 30+ years of pretty high income may see almost no difference, but I would have expected to see some difference.

 

[JoeWras]

Welcome John!

We just had a discussion on this subject in another thread. The upshot is if you've worked for 25 or 30 years, with most of them being good paying, then you won't see a whole lot of difference. If 20 of those years were part time minimum wage, then you'd see some changes.

I also wanted to say I'm about your age and discovered my ER surprise just recently, and an obsession has hit me also. Welcome to the club!

 

[racy]

Calculate your Social Security benefits:

How to Calculate Social Security Benefits - A Step by Step Guide

 

[CMH in CO]

The calculation is based upon your highest 35 years of income. That is why years of part-time or no work at all before you retire can sometimes make little difference. There is explanation in the website about it.

Cass

 

[truenorth418]

I was pleasantly surprised to find that I would be entitled to about 83% of my benefit after retiring at age 47 with only 23 years of full time work.